ANIMATED NUMBERS perform an imagined dance as they rearrange themselves according to the "merge" move in the authors' new "M12" puzzle—one of three "sporadic simple" puzzles the two have created.
Image: Matt Collins
In Brief
- Success in “solving” Rubik’s Cube depends on discovering short sequences of moves that accomplish limited goals.
- But the strategy is so successful that the authors yearned for puzzles whose solutions would require novel tactics.
- Basing their work on the mathematical theory of groups so well illustrated by Rubik’s Cube, the authors have devised three new games that challenge today’s generation of puzzle lovers with the complexities of “sporadic simple groups.”
More In This Article
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Sidebar
How to Solve the Rubik's Cube
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Sidebar
What Is a Sporadic Simple Group?
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Sidebar
Puzzles: Simple Groups at Play
Editor's Note: The online puzzles mentioned in the July magazine can be found here.
Millions of people have been perplexed at one time or another by Rubik’s Cube, a fascinating puzzle that took the world by storm in the 1980s. If you somehow missed the puzzle—or the 1980s—the cube is a plastic gizmo that appears to be made up of 27 small cubes, or “cubies,” stacked into a larger cube, three cubies to an edge. Each of the six square faces of the larger cube is colored in one of six eye-catching colors—typically blue, green, orange, red, yellow or white. We said the cube appears to be a stack of cubies, but appearances here are deceptive. An ingenious mechanism, invented in 1974 by a Hungarian teacher named Erno Rubik (and, independently, in 1976 by a Japanese engineer named Terutoshi Ishige), enables any of the six square faces of the large cube to be twisted about the center of that face. Twist the faces in some random sequence five or six times, and you have a cube so scrambled that only an expert—a cubemeister—can restore order. The object of the puzzle is to put an arbitrarily scrambled cube back into its original state, one solid color per face, thereby “solving” the cube.
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21 Comments
Add Commenti want to know how to play rubik's cube.......
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI do not see where we can download the games, as I think was mentioned in the article.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNeed group game.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOK, I bought the magazine, read the article. It said there were 3 puzzles available. WHERE ARE THEY?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisphooey
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI I also tried to get the three puzzles and was unable to find them.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe article is as always very interesting. I am just disappointed to be unable to get the extra texts.
I thought I had downloaded dotto but I cant find it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisHas it got a special file all of its own and my computer doesn't recognise it ?
how do I download the puzzles? The article says the 3 games are available online?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=puzzles-simple-groups-at-play
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.sciam.com/media/inline/2008-07/puzzles/m12.html
http://www.sciam.com/media/inline/2008-07/puzzles/m24.html
http://www.sciam.com/media/inline/2008-07/puzzles/dotto.zip
http://www.sciam.com/media/inline/2008-07/puzzles/m12.html
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.sciam.com/media/inline/2008-07/puzzles/m24.html
http://www.sciam.com/media/inline/2008-07/puzzles/dotto.zip
blablabla im on school --_-- but damn these puzzle im doing it on school now and one next to me solves a 5x5 in 47 seconds damn hes good whatever we try to hussle he will pass in 50 sec at max.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisblablabla im on school --_-- but damn these puzzle im doing it on school now and one next to me solves a 5x5 in 20 sec with one hand without even looking really at it he just looks how weve put it and wham,,,,, damn hes good whatever we try to hussle he will pass in 20 sec at max. he just looks ho we had put it puts it in one hand and begins to hussle just to fast we cant follow it :P
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisgood lord his mate is even better, hes the real god in it XD
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisgood lord his mate is even better,
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisthe magazine that I PAY to subscribe to SciAm says the puzzles are here; now that I get here you want to PAY again!!! NO WAY!! And further I will not renew. Your absolute GREED is appalling
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisvery impressive
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisvery impressive
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisi know how to solve robic's cube but in another way than the one in the article
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisand I find my way alot easier and faster
and if any one found the puzzles please tell me where they are